Covers Contest: Suffer the Children

The cultural elevation of graphic novels may be a tired expression of the fetishization of childhood, but Joel Bass doesn’t care: he won last week’s Covers Contest. The proprietor of the contest would probably rather read Terry McAuliffe’s autobiography—“for $500,000, I didn’t mind humiliating myself”—but he admits that the covers are great.

This week, in the words of an oldies d.j. or an ESPN anchor, we’re taking it way back. When you were a little wriggler, these helped you forge in the smithy of your soul the uncreated etc.; now, they’re mere tools in a bitter competition. Below are details from the covers of four children’s books. What are they? E-mail us with your answers: the author of the first fully correct response will win a 2008 New Yorker Festival T-shirt, wrinkled.